


The Great Undergarment Quest of 1852

by Tangerine_Catnip



Category: Dishonored (Video Games)
Genre: Age Difference, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, F/F, Femslash, Guilt, Pining, Romantic Comedy, victorian underwear
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-11-28
Updated: 2017-11-28
Packaged: 2019-02-07 21:25:06
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,222
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12849819
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Tangerine_Catnip/pseuds/Tangerine_Catnip
Summary: When it comes time to record pivotal moments in history, many less momentous details of the story often go untold. This is one of them.





	The Great Undergarment Quest of 1852

 

"Ugh. You have got to be kidding me!"

"Just keep pulling, I think you've almost got it."

Meagan looked down at the mess of thread crisscrossing Emily's spine. Parts of it hung loose, while others were far too tight. Meagan wasn't even reasonably sure there weren't knots hidden somewhere, and with only one hand, searching would take ages.

"Trust me. I really don't got it," Meagan insisted.

Emily let go of the breath she had been holding and said, "Maybe we should start from the beginning again?"

Meagan snorted. She didn't want to try again, she wanted to rip this stupid whalebone filled nightmare into a million pieces and carve charms out of the remains.

"Who designs underwear like this?"

Emily sighed, and half turned to look over her shoulder. "People who want to prove they can afford servants to help them get dressed every morning."

Meagan narrowed her eyes at Emily and crossed her arm over her chest. "I'm not your servant empress."

Emily winced at the tinge if venom in her voice. "I know, and I'm sorry, but I can't do it by myself."

"Then stop wearing it."

"I can't! It's all I have to…" Emily trailed off, searching for a way to phrase it. Uh, you know… keep things in place? Delilah didn't exactly give me time to pack a bag."

Meagan nodded. She had to concede that point to the ex-empress. They were lucky that Emily's tastes ran towards the practical, or she might have ended up trying to escape Dunwall in high heeled boots.

Meagan tapped her folded fingers lightly against her lip as she thought it over.

"What size are they?" Meagan asked.

"What?"

"What's size are your breasts, your Majesty?" Meagan asked again, louder this time.

Emily took a step away from Meagan, her cheeks turning pink.

"My  **measurements**  are 109 over-bust, 96 under-bust," Emily replied as primly as she could.

Meagan looked down at Emily's corset, her eyebrows knitting. "Really? This thing holds all that?"

"Meagan!"

"Okay, okay. So, I can't lend you one of mine…"

Meagan let out a deep breath. She knew what she had to do. "I'll be right back. Take this thing off in the meantime."

Meagan left the room and backtracked into the hull of the dreadful whale.

"Now I just have to remember where in the void I left it..." Meagan muttered to herself.

She tried the kitchen first since that was usually where she injured herself, but after turning out every cupboard, all she found was several cans of jellied eels.

She tried Anton's room next, suspecting that he might have taken it for the hydrogen peroxide. She didn't like going in there when he was still missing, but the empress needed her, so she persevered.

Another ten minutes later, she was in a markedly worse mood and still missing her first aid kit.

"Come on, think…" Meagan rested her head in her hand. Maybe she had moved it? But why would she?

"Void, damn it!"

Meagan went back to Emily's room and got down on her knees beside her cot. After feeling about under it, she finally laid her hand on a thoroughly rusted metal box covered in peeling red paint.

"I forgot I left it in here in case you came back injured," Meagan explained.

She cracked it open and pulled out one of the rolls of white cotton bandages.

She turned back to Emily, who was sitting in the chair next to her desk.

"I thought I told you to take that off?" Meagan said.

"I did?" Emily said, glancing at the corset laying on the desk beside her.

"I meant all of it," Meagan clarified, pointing with her right elbow to the long-sleeved white chemise Emily still had on.

Emily's mouth dropped open. "Is that really necessary?"

"Yes, it is. I can't bind blind. At best it'll be uncomfortable, at worst, I could cut off the circulation to some very important parts of your body."

Emily bit her lip, the colour returning to her cheeks.

Meagan rolled her eyes. "You haven't got anything I haven't seen before, many times."

Emily huffed. "That doesn't really help…"

She sighed stood up, took up the hem of her chemise, and pulled it over her head.

Meagan kept her expression neutral, but in the back of her head, a traitorous little voice whispered. 'Shit, she's absolutely gorgeous. Like a pin-up poster come to life.'

Emily dropped the white fabric and crossed her arms over her chest.

"So? Are you going to do it?"

"Yes. Just figuring out where to start…" Meagan lied.

She began to unravel the bandages as she took a step closer to Emily. She wrapped the bandages once below Emily's breasts, using her right arm to hold it in place while working with her left hand.

As she had told Emily, she needed to watch what she was doing, so there really wasn't any chance of preserving the empress's modesty.

Outsider's teeth, they were huge. What did they feed this girl at the tower?

It also didn't help that Emily kept making little breathy noises every time Meagan pulled the bandages taught.

"Stop me if it hurts…" Meagan said.

"No… I've had worse. It's just…"

Emily never finished that sentence, which was probably for the best.

Meagan grit her teeth. She needed to focus on what she was doing, and not on how much noise Emily could make if she put more intention into her touches.

Meagan tied off the end and took a step back. At some point Emily had closed her eyes, so she didn't realise it was over right away.

The first thing she did was glance down, gasping when she saw how flat her chest was.

She gently prodded the bandages, feeling how the pressure from all sides was compressing her chest.

"They're… gone."

Emily tried swaying back and forth, testing her range of motion.

"Yeah. I used to do this every day for a friend of mine," Meagan explained. Because of the gas masks and thick coats, it hadn't really been essential, but Dean had said it made him feel more comfortable, so she had helped him out.

"It worked out really well until he broke a rib," Meagan added almost as an afterthought.

"O-oh..." Emily stammered. She tentatively pulled at some of the bandages, assessing the tightness. It didn't feel that bad…

"That's why this is only a temporary solution. Put your clothes on and meet me at the skiff."

Meagan swept out of the room, forcing herself not to take even a tiny look back at the onyx-haired goddess that had somehow wound up sharing her leaky old ship.

If Billie Lurk were around, she'd be absolutely disgusted to see her practically drooling over an aristocrat. She'd probably scream about how the fortunes of people like Emily were built with the broken bones of people like her, and at best she'd only ever be an idle amusement for the empress before she settled down with someone better befitting her position.

But Billie didn't know Emily the way Meagan did. Where Billie had seen a spoiled child, Meagan saw a capable and well-trained young woman who despite being so ill-fitted for her position, was still willing to take on the burden of setting things right.

Even when on the throne, Emily's biggest crime had been ignorance. She'd been given power long before she was ready, and had gotten used to the people around her leading her by the hand.

-And who's fault was it that Jessamine wasn't around to teach her daughter how to govern?

Meagan waited by the skiff, taking deep pulls of the salty air to calm herself down. She had just about managed to recover when Emily appeared.

The ex-empress's coat was buttoned up a little tighter than usual, and her golden magpie pin had moved to hold the loose fabric together, but if Meagan didn't know where to look those details would have been hard to spot.

"You didn't explain where we're going," Emily said when she got closer.

"Shopping," Meagan replied simply as she turned to work the mechanism that would lower the skiff into the ocean.

Emily frowned. "But any corset we get will be just as unmanageable as my old one, won't it?"

Meagan paused mid leaver-pull and raised both eyebrows at the ex-empress. "You know majesty, there are a lot of woman in the empire who would rather retain their ability to breath."

The skiff reached deck level. Meagan stepped into it and offered her hand to Emily to help her over the gap.

"I'm not sure I catch your meaning."

"Then why don't we make it a surprise?" Meagan offered with a smirk.

* * *

 

Meagan eventually found a spot where she could dock the skiff without drawing attention, and they disembarked.

"Can you follow me while keeping out of sight?" Meagan asked.

Emily nodded, and Meagan turned her back, supposedly to start walking down the street, but also to give Emily the moment of privacy she needed to vanish herself up onto the nearest rooftop.

Meagan felt the goosebumps rise on the back of her neck as the energy of the void dissipated behind her. Emily hadn't yet confided in Meagan about her unusual abilities, and Meagan pretended she didn't suspect anything.

After all, how could she know about what the mark of the outsider was and what it did to its bearer? She was just an over-curios ship captain who happened to be in the right places at the right times.

Meagan navigated the streets of Karnaca like a native, (which she was. Born in this city and not anywhere else.) taking side streets and alleyways to navigate by checkpoints while also steering clear of howler territory.

Occasionally, she glanced up to see if she could spot Emily. She caught one or two glimpses, usually by judging where she would go if it were her on those rooftops.

She moved with a speed and grace that would have made Billie Lurk jealous if this Emily had been around when The Whalers stalked the streets of Dunwall.

Was it ironic that Emily would have fit in perfectly with the very gang that had murdered her mother? No, probably only a coincidence… and maybe not even that, since if her mother was alive, her father might not have seen the need to teach her how to defend herself so effectively.

Lost in her thoughts, Meagan managed to turn the corner and take several steps toward a squad of grand guard before she noticed them, and even more importantly, the wall of light they were standing in front of.

"Fuck," Meagan hissed through her teeth. That hadn't been there a week ago.

Meagan altered her course and slipped into a side street to give herself a chance to think. A few minutes later Emily rounded the corner, sticking to the shadows until she was at Meagan's side.

"Is there a way around?" Emily asked.

"I don't know…" Meagan admitted. She was trying to map out the city in her mind, but any route she started plotting eventually got too circuitous to feel confident about.

Emily glanced up, and Meagan followed her gaze. The buildings around the wall of light were about the same height. Bypassing it via the rooftops would be simple, but that was assuming she could get up there in the first place. Lately, climbing hadn't been Meagan's strong point.

Meagan met Emily's eyes, she could practically hear the younger woman's thought process. Emily could get them both up to that rooftop in the blink of an eye, but it would mean revealing her little secret.

"I have an idea, but you're going to have to trust me," Emily said, holding out her hand to Meagan.

Meagan nodded and stepped forward without question, letting Emily wrap her right arm around her back.

"Hold on tight, okay?" Emily insisted. Meagan complied, even though she didn't quite see the need for it.

Emily held her hand out toward the nearest building, and Meagan caught a glimpse of an orange glow before the world suddenly jerked sideways.

Meagan's stomach leapt into her throat as gravity inverted. The wind howled in her ears and her vision blurred, then Emily landed them both on their feet with the grace of a bird touching down on a perch.

Emily kept her grip around Meagan, which she was grateful for. She wasn't sure if she was ready to fully support her own weight yet. That wasn't at all what Meagan had been expecting. They had just flown, not passed through invisible space to get from one point to another, but quite literally taken flight.

Emily let her down slowly until Meagan found her footing. She was breathing heavily, trying to slow her racing pulse.

"Are you okay?" Emily asked.

"Y-yeah… just, give me a moment," Meagan replied.

Emily nodded and waited patiently for Meagan to catch her breath.

"I probably owe you an explanation," Emily admitted.

Meagan straitened up and shook her head. "No, it's okay. Take my word that I have no moral high ground when it comes to heresy. We can leave it there."

Emily frowned. Meagan didn't get the opportunity to hear what Emily might have said next because she interrupted her first.

"It's not much further. We should keep moving before it gets dark."

* * *

 

The only way to enter the shop was through the back. They passed a howler who was on her way out, but Meagan didn't give her a second look. Madam Elouise had a strict policy about fighting or threatening others around her shop, and none of her costumers wanted to run the risk of being cut off from her services.

A bell on the inside of the door jangled as it shut behind them and a voice from an adjoining room behind the counter called, "Hold on, I just need to finish these last few stitches!"

Meagan paused to let Emily take in her surroundings. She'd also needed a moment to collect herself the first time she'd stepped out of a dark ally and into the well-lit, plushy pink boudoir. Cloth mannequins lined the walls, displaying a devise selection of lace, leather, cotton, and silk, all arranged to frame and flatter the female figure.

Some left more to the imagination than others and personally, Meagan favoured those. She loved laying her lover down and unwrapping her slowly as she explored her body.

There was one garment that Meagan was having a hard time keeping her eye off. It involved a corset like Emily's, but this one was made almost entirely of leather and fashioned up the front with tiny clasps.

She imagined herself taking them one at a time, pausing in between to trail kisses along her lover's neck and shoulders, toy with her silky black hair, and stare into her keen brown eyes.

Meagan glanced over at Emily and swallowed. Perhaps she should try to wait outside after she got her Majesty settled?

Before she could think more about it, a figure appeared in the doorway of the back room.

She had a truly impressive stature, taking up almost all the room in the doorway. She was dressed in a pair of bright pink pants and an equally pink shirt with prominent shoulder pads and ruffled sleeves.

"Ah, Meagan! How wonderful to see you again," Madam Elouise said, breaking out into a wide smile. She swept around the counter and walked toward Meagan her arms open wide, then she noticed Emily standing beside her and stopped dead in her tracks.

"And you've brought a… 'friend'?" Madam Elouise added, with a slight emphasis on the word friend that made it clear that she didn't think that was the extent of the relationship.

Madam Elouise's smile dropped as she took a closer look at Emily. "Now dear, while I'm fully aware that the nature of my services might give some sections of society very good reasons to hide their identity, I'm not sure if I can properly fit anyone who won't show me their face."

Meagan bit her bottom lip. She had thought this might be a problem. Madam Elouise was the type of creative who valued her craft over any amount of coin. She would no more send a woman out in a mismatched corset than Anton would release a flawed prototype.

"I can promise you my full discretion. Outsider knows my business would go under if I started blabbing about who I've done fittings for."

Emily looked over at Meagan for help.

"I'm sorry Madam, but we really-"

Elouise raised her voice, speaking right over Meagan. "Your clothing is trimmed with gold and dyed with tyrian purple, so you have to be royalty of some description. Cousin of the King of Morley? Daughter of a High Judge? Beloved concubine to the Duke? Which is it?"

Meagan and Emily shared a look, and Meagan shrugged her shoulders. She had known Madam Elouise for years, and she was a decent woman. There probably wasn't much harm in having her know.

Emily slipped her fingers under her bandanna and pulled it down.

Madam Elouise gasped, both hands coming up to cover her mouth.

"Meagan! What have you managed to get yourself wrapped up in?" Madam Elouise exclaimed.

"Nothing I can't handle," Meagan replied flatly. "We came here because Emily needs a better solution for her upper body support than the corsets she's used to."

"I see," Madam Elouise replied before turning to Emily to ask, "You plan to be very active? Lots of running and jumping?"

"Exactly," Emily confirmed.

"Do you know your chest measurements?"

"109 over-bust 96 under-bust."

"And no doubt you need it as soon as possible…" Madam Elouise gestured over to a pair of wooden stalls set between two clothing racks. "The fitting rooms are over there. Take off your shirt, and I'll be with you in a moment."

With that, Madam Elouise vanished into the back room.

"Is this whole day going to be nothing but people demanding I get undressed?" Emily muttered under her breath.

Meagan gave her a sympathetic pat on the shoulder, then sat herself down on one of the nearby sofas to wait.

Out of the corner of her eye, Meagan watched Madam Elouise return with a garment folded over her arm and a pincushion in her hand. She had no doubt Emily was in good hands, so she let it pass from her attention.

Right now, she needed to acknowledge the blood-ox in the room, or in her mind at least. She couldn't say that Emily was not what she expected, since if she hadn't believed Emily was capable of recreating her father's accomplishments, she wouldn't be sending her out into the city on the trail of Delilah's conspirators. However, Meagan had failed to realise that all the same aspects that made Emily an effective assassin were also things she personally found irresistible.

There used to be a running joke among The Whalers that if you wanted to bed Billie Lurk all you had to do was best her in combat. There was also a kernel of truth to that, even if it had never actually happened since the only person more skilled than she was hadn't much interest in bedding anyone.

It had taken her a while to get over that rejection, even though there wasn't any fault on either side and had she been paying attention, she would have seen it coming.

Billie had more ex-lovers then fingers, but somehow experience had never helped softened the heartache when they left her, be it by disagreement, death, circumstance, or just bad luck.

When Meagan fell in love, she never landed on her feet. Right now, there was just a flutter in her chest, but she knew with a terrible certainty that with every hard-fought victory, every warm night spent over a bowl of hot stew, every blearily morning staring out over the sea, her admiration would grow and grow until the pining was unbearable.

Maybe if Emily had only been gorgeous and skilful, Meagan could have stood a chance, but Emily also had the kind of personality that attracted her like a rat to fresh meat. Mercurial to a fault, while also managing to be ambitious and strongminded. At her best, Emily made you feel like you would happily follow her to the end of the void and back.

But no matter how much it hurt, Meagan couldn't give in, because the only thing more awful than unrequited love was crushing guilt.

Whenever she let herself imagine what a relationship with Emily might be like, there was always the lingering spectre lurking in the back of her mind and whispering 'how could you?'

How could she even think about touching Emily with the same hand that had pointed out the rooftops that would allow access to the tower gardens? Or kiss her with the same lips that had told Jessamine's murderer when to launch the attack.

Sometimes when she looked at Emily she could still hear the sounds of a child screaming as she was tied up and blindfolded, and a voice that sounded like hers growling; "Won't that stupid brat just shut up?"

A light tap on her shoulder snapped Meagan out of her thoughts. She looked up and instantly forgot how to breathe.

Emily was standing before her wearing her new undergarment. Each of her breasts were held up separately in two perfectly sized pockets of plain white cotton, while thick straps over her shoulders and a tight band underneath provided support.

"Does this look okay?" Emily asked, spinning around to show it off.

Meagan tried to reply, but it was like her tongue had turned to lead in her mouth.

Emily's smile faded as her friend's silence stretched on.

"Is it really that bad?" Emily asked.

Meagan shook her head, forcing herself back together. "It doesn't matter what it looks like, as long as it's functional," she replied.

Emily nodded. "Good point. Should I test it?"

Without waiting for a response, Emily started bouncing up and down on her heels.

"Watch the pins!" Madam Elouise called, making Emily stop mid-bounce.

"There's a little give, but it's much more manageable," Emily decided. "How come I've never heard of these before?"

"Probably because they knew they'd never get you back into a corset," Meagan suggested.

Madam Elouise appeared beside Emily, and she led the ex-empress back to the changing rooms so she could put the final stitches into her new garment.

Her quick fingers made fast work of the task, and soon Emily was fully dressed, the front of her jacket resting properly now that it had been filled in.

Meagan reached for her satchel of coin to pay Madam Elouise, but the matron took her hand first.

"I don't want your money, Meagan. Consider this my contribution to your cause," Elouise said.

Meagan frowned, but coin was tight enough that she wasn't going to refuse.

"I never had you pegged as a loyalist," Meagan said.

"I am when the alternative means war with Tyvia and Morley. I have family in both, and I should like to see them again," Madam Elouise replied. She turned to Emily and bowed her head. "Good luck, your Majesty. I'm glad we could get you sorted out."

Emily accepted her warm wishes with a tilt of her head and a smile. "When I'm back on the throne you should expect a pile of orders coming in from Dunwall. As Meagan said, there's no way in the void I'm going back to corsets."

"Corsets can still have their uses…" Madam Elouise murmured, her eyes meeting Meagan's.

* * *

 

Emily and Meagan walked together for a bit. Night had fallen while they were in the shop and the streets had emptied out.

"Thank you. I really do feel a lot better now," Emily said.

"I'm not surprised. It's kind of a miracle you even made it this long."

Emily nodded. "When you live in Dunwall tower, you're encouraged to assume that things are the way they are for a reason and that they shouldn't change. It applies to policy as much as it does to my undergarments."

The ex-empress stopped walking and reached out to take Megan's upper arm, halting her as well. "Back then, I never realised how limited my perspective was, but the more time I spend with you, the easier it is to see," Emily explained. "When I have the crown again, if I'm a better ruler, I'll owe part of that to you."

Meagan blinked at her, utterly tongue-tied for the second time that night. How could Emily manage to just come out and say something like that?

"Uhhhh…"

Emily laughed and stepped closer to Meagan her hands moving to hold the older woman's cheeks. "You know, I don't think you're as good at hiding your emotions as you think you are… I may be a little naive, but I'm not blind… and I think I've done more than enough teasing for one night."

Emily leaned in and gently pressed their lips together.

'Shit,' Meagan thought. The single word echoing like the crack of a firework in her mind.

Meagan's arm crossed behind Emily's back. She pulled her closer, leaning into the kiss.

**'Shit.'**


End file.
